- All About Dennis (Part 1)
I think the turning point in my life occurred in the third grade. The entire class took a series of achievement tests to see how we compared with other students in the state. I can still remember the anguish of that ordeal. My teacher announced to the class, "Dennis Swanberg didn't do very well." I made a joke out of it, but deep down, it hurt. I began to wonder whether I was retarded or just plain dumb. Was I truly different from other kids? Did I belong in Special Ed?
By the time third grade rolls around, the cream is beginning to rise to the top. The brains of the class are revealed, and every kid knows where he or she stands. Kids begin to label each other as smart or dumb. I found my self-image beginning to crumble, and life seemed a lot more complicated than it had ever been before.
It was in third grade that I started to become "street smart" to compensate. I used humor to cover the pain I was feeling about being different from the other kids. Matthew 10:16 says, "Be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves," and now as I look back, I think that describes me at that time of my life. I had to develop the cleverness to get around the "minefields" in the academic classroom every day, but do it without injuring anybody else's feelings.
I learned to intentionally get to know my teachers and make sure they knew me. I would talk to them before and after class, visit with them during their office hours, and ask them for help when I was really stumped. If I felt they liked me, I would work all the harder just to please them. They would often give me the benefit of the doubt when I struggled with an answer in class because they knew how hard I was working. They wanted me to succeed because I had taken the time to nurture a relationship.
I found that I could really shine in subjects like English and journalism if the teacher allowed me to give a verbal rather than a written report. I covered all the same material when I gave the report, but I didn't have to struggle to get it down on paper. I got great grades when they let me do this because I'd add humor to get the point across. The result was that my reports were really entertaining, rather than just informative or factual.
When I gave a verbal report, the teacher and the class were so entertained that I suddenly felt like a winner rather than a loser. And my image began to change: My friends started to think that maybe I wasn't the dummy they'd thought I was. To this day, I use the same technique I did back then to prepare for a performance: I tape-record what I want to say, transcribe it, and then make changes to the routine as I study the result.
Another way I got around the minefields in the classroom was doing the exact opposite of what they tell you to do in business management seminars: I would do all the little things first - knock out all the small things cluttering up my desk. This freed my mind to do the big things without any distractions. Also, I would not study for an exam until the night before a test because I learned that I would forget the material if I prepared too far in advance. Again, this is probably the opposite of what a student without ADHD would do, but I was fighting to survive in school!
No one knew how badly I was hurting inside because of my struggle to survive in school. I didn't think my parents would understand. My conduct in school seemed to be more important to them than my education. I felt very much alone a lot of the time, and I didn't know anybody to turn to for encouragement or emotional support. I guess I could have shared some of these feelings with a few of my favorite teachers, but I shoved them all inside, and it wasn't until my own son was tested for ADHD years later that I was finally able to express the pain I had kept hidden for so long.
If I'd had a tutor, it would have been a godsend. But I didn't, so I just began to float through the system, filling in the gaps with humor and sports. ADHD wasn't even in the vocabulary back then, and I think everybody just thought of me as a goof-off. They didn't know how much I ached inside, how much it bothered me that I wasn't like everybody else in the classroom. Why did academics come so easily to them and not to me? I studied and worked harder than any of my friends, and I was just not making it!
I did just well enough to be passed on to middle school, but the English, math, and science courses were tough for me. Again, I learned "the system," put my personality into overdrive, and made it work. But by the time I got to high school, I could no longer hide my weaknesses. I decided that anyone as stupid as I was couldn't go to college, so I took courses for the non college-bound students.
The funny thing is, even though I was struggling with all this internal turmoil, the tactics I used to survive paid off! I was a class officer; I helped start a chapter of Fellowship of Christian Athletes at my school; I was a Rotary honorary Youth of the Month winner as well as a Kiwanis Award Teenager and an Optimist Club Youth Award winner! And I was asked to speak and perform all the time!
I will never forget the night of our football banquet after our team had won the Texas State Football Championship in 1970. The Lt. Governor of Texas was there to speak, but the coach asked me to say a few words to the audience beforehand. I did a whole handful of imitations of entertainers popular at that time and even included an imitation of the head coach. The audience howled, and the headlines in the newspaper the next day read, "Swanberg Steals Show!" My ADHD was the reason I could get up and entertain a crowd.
However, athletics was really what saved me. I played football and baseball and was All District in both sports. I would never have had the opportunity for the success I enjoy today if a football scholarship hadn't gotten me into college.
I could never have become a pastor or a speaker or have had a successful television show if it had not been for that athletic scholarship!
God had a plan for my life. But sometimes, late at night when sleep eludes me on the road, I hang my head in my hands and wonder what would have become of the or Swan if I had been uncoordinated and never set foot on an athletic field. The academic system would have doomed me, and it's very likely I would not have lived up to my potential or been able to use the gifts God gave me to help others.
Some of the important lessons learned:
1. Overactive kids may have untapped creativity.
2. Underachieving may be a mask ADHD children wear.
3. Some ADHD kids learn to cope in school by becoming "street smart" and learning the system. It is their way to survive in a "hostile" environment.
4. Although ADHD kids often have the tendency to become underachievers, they may put in longer hours and work harder than other students.
In the next post, we'll hear from Diane and her daughter Danielle, who was diagnosed with ADHD in college. To learn how to handle ADHD children, you can get ADHD Natural Remedy Report.
